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- Member of: Theses and Dissertations
Description
Sentencing reform has been the subject of much debate in the 21st century and has resulted in a great deal of consternation in state and federal systems of government (Chesney-Lind, 2012). The public does not view incarceration as an important topic needing attention or requiring change, which makes invisible the needs and histories of prisoners as a consequence of not addressing them (Connor, 2001). Through an analysis of the spectrum of women’s crime, ranging from non-violent drug trafficking to homicide, I conclude within this paper that the criminal justice system was written as a male-oriented code of addressing crime, which has contributed to women being made into easier targets for arrest and female imprisonment at increasing rates for longer lengths of time.
In the last decade, California’s imprisoned population of women has increased by nearly 400% (Chesney-Lind, 2012). The focus of this thesis is to discuss the treatment—or lack thereof—of women within California’s criminal justice system and sentencing laws. By exploring its historical approach to two criminal actions related to women, the Three Strikes law (including non-violent drug crimes) and the absence of laws accounting for experiences of female victims of domestic violence who killed their abusers, I explore how California’s criminal code has marginalized women, and present a summary of the adverse effects brought about by the gender invisibility that is endemic within sentencing policies and practice. I also discuss recent attempted and successful reforms related to these issues, which evidence a shift toward social dialogue on sentencing aiming to address gender inequity in the sentencing code. These reforms were the result of activism; organizations, academics and individuals successfully raised awareness regarding excessive and undue sentencing of women and compelled action by the legislature.
By method of a feminist analysis of these histories, I explore these two pertinent issues in California; both are related to women who, under harsh sentencing laws, were incarcerated under the state’s male-focused legislation. Responses to the inequalities found in these laws included attempts toward both visibility for women and reform related to sentencing. I analyze the ontology of sentencing reform as it relates to activism in order to discuss the implications of further criminal code legislation, as well as the implications of the 2012 reforms in practice. Through the paper, I focus upon how women have become a target of arrest and long sentences not because they are strategically arrested to equalize their representation behind bars, but because the “tough on crime” framework in the criminal code cast a wide and fixed net that incarcerated increasingly more women following the codification of both mandatory minimums and a male-oriented approach to sentencing (Chesney-Lind et. al, 2012).
In the last decade, California’s imprisoned population of women has increased by nearly 400% (Chesney-Lind, 2012). The focus of this thesis is to discuss the treatment—or lack thereof—of women within California’s criminal justice system and sentencing laws. By exploring its historical approach to two criminal actions related to women, the Three Strikes law (including non-violent drug crimes) and the absence of laws accounting for experiences of female victims of domestic violence who killed their abusers, I explore how California’s criminal code has marginalized women, and present a summary of the adverse effects brought about by the gender invisibility that is endemic within sentencing policies and practice. I also discuss recent attempted and successful reforms related to these issues, which evidence a shift toward social dialogue on sentencing aiming to address gender inequity in the sentencing code. These reforms were the result of activism; organizations, academics and individuals successfully raised awareness regarding excessive and undue sentencing of women and compelled action by the legislature.
By method of a feminist analysis of these histories, I explore these two pertinent issues in California; both are related to women who, under harsh sentencing laws, were incarcerated under the state’s male-focused legislation. Responses to the inequalities found in these laws included attempts toward both visibility for women and reform related to sentencing. I analyze the ontology of sentencing reform as it relates to activism in order to discuss the implications of further criminal code legislation, as well as the implications of the 2012 reforms in practice. Through the paper, I focus upon how women have become a target of arrest and long sentences not because they are strategically arrested to equalize their representation behind bars, but because the “tough on crime” framework in the criminal code cast a wide and fixed net that incarcerated increasingly more women following the codification of both mandatory minimums and a male-oriented approach to sentencing (Chesney-Lind et. al, 2012).
ContributorsD'Souza, Kristin Tessa (Author) / Gomez, Alan (Thesis director) / Fonow, Mary Margaret (Committee member) / Leone Hamm, Donna (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
Passed in April of 2010, Arizona Senate Bill 1070 is nationally recognized as the first state-level anti-immigration legislation of its kind that deputized local police officers to enforce immigration laws. Though response strategies varied widely across activists and organizations, many community organizations devised strategies specifically aimed to protect and assist the undocumented community during the reign of terror that accompanied SB 1070. In looking at the reflections of activists and organization leaders on their own actions and decision-making rationale, I analyze how their strategies and tactics worked to both counter and reconceptualize hegemonic notions of citizenship, belonging, and community through the creation of networks and knowledge funds. By specifically examining the efforts made by No Mas Muerte, Puente Human Rights Movement, and the Calle Dieciseis Mural Project, I show that efforts that go beyond voter mobilization and legal action, which not only work to combat dominant rhetoric but also center the voices of the targeted population through disrupting public space, are essential to responding to political efforts designed to target vulnerable communities. Given their necessity, academics and institutional actors must acknowledge the importance of grassroots efforts in contributing to inter-institutional strategies and ensure that a ground-up analysis of community-based organizations informs their actions taken against state-level anti-immigration laws.
ContributorsMorris, Jordan (Author) / Gomez, Alan (Abridger) / Brian, Jennifer (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / Historical, Philosophical & Religious Studies, Sch (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
My thesis is an autoethnography considering the ways to be a respectful and effective ally and advocate for racial justice issues as a White person. I have written my paper as a love letter to my Indigenous sister, synthesizing the lessons I learned throughout my justice studies courses and applying them to the very personal experience of my relationship with my sister.
ContributorsMetzler, Audrey (Author) / Gomez, Alan (Thesis director) / Hecht, Justine (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / Department of Psychology (Contributor)
Created2022-05
Description
Criminal justice discourse has so far almost ignored a growing movement in police DNA collection, felony arrest DNA collection. Felony arrest collection is the practice of taking a DNA sample from everyone arrested for a felony, not charged nor convicted of a felony. To address this, this thesis project examines the history, concerns, and future of felony arrest DNA collection. It will use a failed attempt to pass felony arrest DNA collection bills in Arizona from 2022, as a case study to understand why this issue is so contentious, and what current evidence there is to support the two emerging sides of this debate. These bills, HB 2102 and 2572, started and died in the state legislature without much fanfare. However, felony arrest DNA collection has received academic attention, with discussions ranging from racial inequality to the security of databases. To bridge the gap, this project will bring academic information and original reporting to the public through the lens of the 2022 bills. It will contribute interviews with relevant political parties, a synthesis from academic sources, and transparent DNA collection rates in Arizona to create a base of knowledge for the future discussions surrounding felony arrest DNA collection.
ContributorsRamirez, Sophia (Author) / Brian, Jennifer (Thesis director) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2024-05
Description
The state of exception in Rwanda did not spontaneously occur in Rwanda, it was initially developed by German and Belgian colonizers, adopted by two successive Hutu regimes, and nurtured and fed for 35 years of Rwandan independence until its final realization in the 1994 genocide. Political theory regarding the development of the "space devoid of law" and necropolitics provide a framework with which to analyze the long pattern of state action that created a milieu in which genocide was an acceptable choice of action for a sovereign at risk of losing power. The study of little-known political theories such as Agamben's and Mbembe's is useful because it provides a lens through which we can analyze current state action throughout the world. As is true in many genocidal regimes, the Rwandan genocide did not just occur as a "descent into hell." Rather, state action over the course of decades in which the subjects of the state (People) were systematically converted into mere flesh beings (people), devoid of political or social value, creates the setting in which it is feasible to seek to eliminate those beings. A question to be posed to political actors and observers around the world today is at what point in the process of one nation's creation of the state of exception and adoption of necropolitics does the world have a right, and a duty, to intervene? Thus far, it has always occurred too late for the "people" in that sovereign to realize their political and social potential to be "People."
ContributorsSinema, Kyrsten (Author) / Johnson, John (Thesis advisor) / Quan, Helen (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Doty, Roxanne (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
The overarching purpose of my dissertation is to offer one Pueblo perspective about research and health education to contribute to critical dialogue among Pueblo people so that relevant research and health education approaches grounded in Pueblo thinking can emerge. Research was a pebble in my shoe that caused me great discomfort as I walked within academia during the many years I worked as a health educator at a university, and continues to bother me. The purpose of my journal article is to discuss why much mainstream research is problematic from a Pueblo Indian standpoint and to explore considerations for research with Pueblo people. The purpose of my book chapter is to reflect on my experiences as a Pueblo Indian health educator to add to the discussion about the importance of grounding Pueblo health education in local Pueblo knowledge systems and to discuss the limitations of delivering health education primarily grounded in a western biomedical disease model. Finally, my policy brief is an urgent call to action for tribal leaders regarding a recent change to the New Mexico Department of Health's race and ethnicity presentation in health data standard. This change resulted in 39,636 American Indians and Alaska Natives in New Mexico being reclassified as Hispanic. It is my intention to connect my ideas about research and health education with the work of other Pueblo scholars to add to the growing body of Pueblo informed writing to contribute to current and future scholarship that will ultimately benefit Pueblo people.
ContributorsSuina, Michele (Author) / Sumida Huaman, Elizabeth (Thesis advisor) / Brayboy, Bryan (Thesis advisor) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This dissertation presents a new tool for analysis of the way difficult experiences
or phenomena influence the process for constructing self-identity in the performance of everyday life. This concept, refraction, emerged as part of a grounded theory methods analysis of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Itacaré, Bahia, Brazil from January to July 2014. The work here contributes to the field of performance studies as a possibility for examining how affective responses to difficult experiences contribute to a shift in perspective and subsequently shifts in the performance of self in everyday life. This research was conducted with critical and reflexive autoethnographic methods in order to hold the research accountable for the ways subject position influences the research. In this case the most salient theme that emerged from these autoethnographic methods was an unpacking of unacknowledged tourist privilege in this setting. The resulting work-in-progress
performance will offer ways for spectators to question their own assumptions
regarding tourist privilege in Brazil, and in so-called developing countries in similar
tropical climates. An additional contribution to the field of performance-based research that resulted from this dissertation is the articulation of a dynamic locus of creativity wherein rigorous established qualitative research methods complement creative practices in conjunction with a spectrum of tacit knowledge and theoretical sensitivities. This juncture becomes the theoretical space where creativity in research can be articulated in ways that are legible to both artists and researchers.
or phenomena influence the process for constructing self-identity in the performance of everyday life. This concept, refraction, emerged as part of a grounded theory methods analysis of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Itacaré, Bahia, Brazil from January to July 2014. The work here contributes to the field of performance studies as a possibility for examining how affective responses to difficult experiences contribute to a shift in perspective and subsequently shifts in the performance of self in everyday life. This research was conducted with critical and reflexive autoethnographic methods in order to hold the research accountable for the ways subject position influences the research. In this case the most salient theme that emerged from these autoethnographic methods was an unpacking of unacknowledged tourist privilege in this setting. The resulting work-in-progress
performance will offer ways for spectators to question their own assumptions
regarding tourist privilege in Brazil, and in so-called developing countries in similar
tropical climates. An additional contribution to the field of performance-based research that resulted from this dissertation is the articulation of a dynamic locus of creativity wherein rigorous established qualitative research methods complement creative practices in conjunction with a spectrum of tacit knowledge and theoretical sensitivities. This juncture becomes the theoretical space where creativity in research can be articulated in ways that are legible to both artists and researchers.
ContributorsPorter, Laurelann (Author) / de la Garza, Sarah Amira (Thesis advisor) / Underiner, Tamara (Thesis advisor) / Mcelroy, Isis (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This master's thesis examines negative stereotypes of blackness in mainstream media in the Dominican Republic, and analyzes the manner in which racial identity has been reinforced and contested. Discourse analysis is utilized to analyze the language and rhetoric of editorials from Listin Diario. The rationale for this study is to assess how Dominicans have learned about blackness through the depictions in media and popular music, and therefore draw conclusions as to how Dominicans view their own racial identity. Considerable attention will be paid to the years between 2010-2013, using the Haitian earthquake disaster of 2010 and Verdict TC 0168-13 of the Dominican Constitutional Tribunal of 2013 as major historical events to frame the study. To these assumptions, this inquiry addresses the following questions: How have Haitians been portrayed in the mainstream newspaper of Listin Diario between the period of 2010-2013? How do the pedagogies in media and popular music educate Dominicans about portrayals of blackness during this period? What are the historiographical roots of these portrayals, particularly regarding the dynamics of race and citizenship? I will demonstrate that the prevailing depictions of Haitians adhere to a historically oriented construction of Dominican identity, known as "Dominicanidad" or "Dominicanness," and that these depictions largely omit African heritage as a contributor to national identity.
ContributorsMora, Omar V (Author) / Schugurensky, Daniel, 1958- (Thesis advisor) / Bontemps, Alex (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Contemporary Christian American politicians have diverse identities when integrating their faith with their political ideology and have developed their worldviews and interpretive schemas and have defended, enacted, and given meaning to their positions, knowingly or unknowingly. There are two distinct theoretical clusters which are a result of an already existing dichotomy. This ideological divide happens along the philosophical notions of individualism or communitarianism, libertarianism or egalitarianism, capitalism or collectivism, literalism or hermeneutics, orthodoxy or praxis. One cluster, Institutional Christianity, exerts a dominating influence on the political and cultural landscape in the US, particularly during the last ten years, and could be considered a hegemonic discourse; while the other, Natural Christianity, serves as the counter-hegemony within a political landscape characterized by a two party system. This study explores the relationship of these dichotomous clusters with contemporary Arizona Christian politicians. Using a phenomenological, qualitative study, interviewing sixteen Arizona Christian politicians, this study yielded ten themes, and binary meaning units within each theme, that describe the essence of politicians' faith and political behavior as they intersect. Finally, this study found, as reported by each subject, what political perspectives generally created a sense of dissonance with one's faith and what perspective exhibited a unified sense of congruence with their faith and political behavior.
ContributorsAbleser, Edward (Author) / Gomez, Alan (Thesis advisor) / Oliverio, Annamaria (Committee member) / Herrera, Richard (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Few studies focus on the MOVE Organization (MOVE), let alone its presences in popular media during the years prior to the MOVE-Philadelphia Conflict (1978-1985), or pre-Conflict. To date, most information about MOVE derives from Conflict research which utilizes archival materials from the Philadelphia Special Investigation Commission (MOVE Commission) hearings. Generations of dominant representations about MOVE and its members, consequently, are mainly constructed by popular media from the MOVE Commission hearings, including video broadcasts of the proceeding. Using a Conflict documentary, I highlight concerns scholars face when heavily using archival materials from MOVE Commission hearings: (a) Archival materials from MOVE Commission hearings lack active MOVE members' voices and (b) Archival materials from MOVE Commission hearings include limited pre-Conflict information about MOVE members. Influenced by Kimberly Sanders and Judson Jeffries' (2013) work about the 1985 bombing newspaper reports' favorability, this project explores pre-Conflict popular media representations of MOVE to understand how the collective first got represented to Philadelphians and the ways which MOVE used popular media to respond to these dominant portrayals.
This mix-methods project utilizes 67-piece dataset materials of various popular media texts by MOVE members and non-MOVE members. It focuses on 48 Philadelphia Tribune newspaper entries as its main text dataset, with an emphasis on the 1975 "On the MOVE" editorial column space. This investigation employs a combination of Black feminist and critical discourse analysis (CDA) methods, with Sanders and Jeffries' (2013) favorability categorizations process, to explore the racialized, gendered, and classed aspects pre-Conflict representations of MOVE.
Quantitative findings suggest that MOVE got generally represented in favorable manners during the pre-Conflict years, with over 50 percent of pre-Conflict texts about MOVE portraying the collective in positive tones. Additionally, qualitative findings propose that MOVE members' authorship and presence in pre-Conflict texts within the Philadelphia Tribune functioned as a site of resistance against dominant portrayal of the collective. CDA findings propose that MOVE's racial attribute, beliefs, and culture, specifically related to self-determination, were central discussions within most pre-Conflict by MOVE members. Unlike Sanders and Jeffries (2013), this project concludes that overall pre-Conflict popular media depictions portrayed MOVE as a positive Philadelphia collective.
This mix-methods project utilizes 67-piece dataset materials of various popular media texts by MOVE members and non-MOVE members. It focuses on 48 Philadelphia Tribune newspaper entries as its main text dataset, with an emphasis on the 1975 "On the MOVE" editorial column space. This investigation employs a combination of Black feminist and critical discourse analysis (CDA) methods, with Sanders and Jeffries' (2013) favorability categorizations process, to explore the racialized, gendered, and classed aspects pre-Conflict representations of MOVE.
Quantitative findings suggest that MOVE got generally represented in favorable manners during the pre-Conflict years, with over 50 percent of pre-Conflict texts about MOVE portraying the collective in positive tones. Additionally, qualitative findings propose that MOVE members' authorship and presence in pre-Conflict texts within the Philadelphia Tribune functioned as a site of resistance against dominant portrayal of the collective. CDA findings propose that MOVE's racial attribute, beliefs, and culture, specifically related to self-determination, were central discussions within most pre-Conflict by MOVE members. Unlike Sanders and Jeffries (2013), this project concludes that overall pre-Conflict popular media depictions portrayed MOVE as a positive Philadelphia collective.
ContributorsEkeogu, Onyekachi Joi (Author) / Quan, Helen (Thesis advisor) / Bortner, Peg (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014